Too many interests - to declutter or embrace?

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Too many interests - to declutter or embrace?

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Started 4 months ago by Stella
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Stella
Member

I just read an amazing book called "Refuse to Choose" by Barbara Sher and reading another one called Renaissance Souls.
It got me thinking about the thread we had on here called "Decluttering Fantasy Selves" (couldn't find it to share the link here)

Refuse to Choose talks about people I can so relate to - those who have a lot of varied and changing interests and different projects going on and some that never seem to get finished, etc. Basically, Barbara Sher calls those people "Scanners" and does a great job of not making you feel guilty and in fact explaining to you how those projects that don't seem finished in any tranditional sense are in fact finished to you. (she also does a fine job of getting you to organize your projects should you be one of the "scanners" who come back to their old interests.)

I enjoyed the book immensly and I stopped feeling guilty about having a lot of interestes I thought I couldn't possibly manage or shouldn't have.

I am embracing my interests now. And with tools like "Evernote" I organize them electronically (I use the same system as she is talking about except that I came up with it on my own, so proud of myself :)), apart from stuff that needs to be physical and I decided to stop looking at them as clutter.

Anyway, having read the book, I see that a lot of people on here seem to be "scanners".
So perhaps we do not need to declutter our Fantasy Selves!

Highly recommended.

Posted 4 months ago #
lottielot
Member

I've read her other book, and you're right, there are probably plenty of people here who would identify with being Scanners. I certainly do :) I love the learning curve which goes with a new interest, but then often get bored once I've learnt as much as I want to, then time for something new! I do think it can still be important to unclutter fantasy selves or old interests though. If you don't go back to them then they certainly can cause clutter.

Posted 4 months ago #
celebkiriedhel
Member

I'm trying to work through this issue at the moment (where moment = 2012). I have a LOT of hobbies and they won't all fit in a 1 bedroom flat.

Trying to work out what to keep and what to go feels like trying to predict the future. Just because I haven't done any last year or two doesn't mean I'm not going to do it again - the last 5 years have been unusual - 3 years of living out of a suitcase in Ireland, and when I finally got back here, 2 years of a dying mother where creativity went to zero. As I finally come back to life myself and work through the grieving process, my interest in craft and so on is coming back.

But at this point of time - how do I work out what is clutter and what isn't?

Posted 4 months ago #
susanintexas
Member

celeb: sounds like you have a good plan -- spend the year re-exploring your old interests to see which ones still engage you. It sounds premature to me to dump everything now when you have been in a position where it has not been possible to engage in them. Sorry you've been through such a bad patch.

Posted 4 months ago #
Mimi
Member

i also have a lot of hobbies or interests. it´s interesting that most of them don´t clutter up my life with physical things, it´s more that they need my time and attention. the clutter consist of bookmarks (articles to be read), books (tob be read, forums (to be read) and what i like to mention about this topics (to be written). if i listen carefully to myself while watching the bookmarks or folders or the pile of books or notes, i know what to do- toss or leave them. if i am interested in a topic, i WANT to read all those articles NOW, if i am not interested anymore, they make me feel like..oooh, nooo, another pile, i don´t want to read that, i don´t have any time left... and i know it´s clutter.

a quote that i read yesterday “ Much of the stress that people feel doesn’t come
from having too much to do. It comes from not finishing what they’ve started.” David Allen.

i ask myself- do i WANT to finish it? if i don´t want to and don´t have a benefit, i move on and toss the stuff. why wait? it´s something that should make me HAPPY, not feeling sad or overwhelmed...

Posted 4 months ago #
Netleigh
Member

I'm still interested in a lot of creative hobbies but with these hobbies therre is a tendency to overestimate what I can accomplish. Thus I have far more materials than I need and from time to time I need to reconsider the collection.

This is really what decluttering my Fantasy Selves is doing, slimming them down and considering if there are any parts that I've lost interest in over the years.

Posted 4 months ago #
Astreja
Member

I'm a recovering scanner. At about this time last year I realized that yes, I was doing a lot of interesting things; but no, I wasn't doing them all that well and I absolutely hated doing them in such a haphazard, uncommitted manner. Something kind of snapped in my mind: I just didn't have the energy to continually jump from this to that to something else, and lack of progression to higher skill levels was making me profoundly unhappy.

That's when I started cutting activities out of my life, and physical stuff out of my home. Three things I always thought there would be room for -- Books, unplayed musical instruments and extra computers -- went out the door. The effect was amazing: It's much easier to concentrate nowadays.

Posted 4 months ago #
themusiclivez
Member

Thank you for posting this. I am definitely a "Scanner". In the past few years I have taken guitar lessons, knitting lessons, purchased a bead loom to make jewelry, bought acrylic and watercolor paints, got back into drawing, and sewed a few cloth dolls by hand.

Am I exceptionally good at any of these things? Nope.

I do the same thing with books. I read books about the Alaskan wilderness, about the Salem Witch Trials, Harry Potter and Twilight, minimalism, random "chick lit" etc. Once I get interested in a topic I find it opens up the pathway to so many other topics.

And then the same thing happens with music. A favorite band of mine covered a song by Bob Dylan. I ended up buying Dylan songs, which branched off into me listening to Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, etc.

I can't tell if I should just "go with it" and see where these interests lead me or if I need to learn to be more selective and focus on one thing. It's like an unquenchable thirst to keep discovering/learning new things. I am grateful for that. But I don't focus on one thing long enough to do it really, really well. I need to reel that in...

Posted 4 months ago #
Emilie
Member

I'll check out those books. And Astreja, I can relate to that frustration. Over the years, I've kept adding more interests and hobbies, but I never abandoned any of the old ones, which led to an increasing sense of overwhelm. I don't want to give any of my interests up, but it's tough because in a lot of them, there are goals I want to accomplish...like, I want to get some of my poetry published, but I feel too scattered to get it done. Maybe it would be a good idea for me to keep all my interests, but just focus on one "main" one at a time. I want to feel more sense of accomplishment.

Posted 4 months ago #
chacha1
Member

Hi Emilie, just a suggestion ... if you don't already have a private blog, why not try posting your poems that way? See how you like them "on the page." Illustrate them with photos or sketches. And if you feel proud of what you've done, you can now self-publish quite respectably (and without paying exorbitant up-front minimum printing fees) thanks to Amazon and other on-demand publishers.

themusiclivez, I for one think music and reading would be much less rewarding pastimes if we forced ourselves to stick to one genre! Brrrr.

As to hobbies, I have let dancing pretty much eat up all my spare time for a loooooong while now. Fortunately I can still use costume construction / embellishment to exercise crafty muscles. But last year I tried to block out time JUST for craftiness and plan to continue that. I have decluttered many artistic "likes" on my way to finding the medium I most enjoy, but that is really something that takes time, thought, and experimentation.

Posted 4 months ago #
ninakk
Member

I think many interests are okay if you are satisfied with that solution, but if you feel unrest, think why; is it because you have too much gear required to keep all of them up or because you can't become really good at just one or a few of them or, blah, a combination of both.
Do some soul searching and give yourself time if you have experienced something out of the ordinary (changes in people, places, health, etc.); don't purge unless you are ready for it.
This is a bit like the "own x items and be a true minimalist". Do what works for you and be prepared to re-evaluate infrequently; don't stress when the time comes for the latter.

I'm only learning this myself so the above written is definitely not universal truth :D

Posted 4 months ago #
Conny
Member

Having already decided i will not be knitting anymore (arthritis in my hands) and all the other crafts that require fiddly work, i gave away a lot of my craft material already, even though i miss it. (a source of meditation)
For me it is having to face reality that i simply do not have the time or capability to continue with some projects...and yet, i do have enough other projects as it is, so it is an on-going process.
As ninakk just posted above, i will be re-evaluating infrequently.

Posted 4 months ago #
Stella
Member

@themusiclivez - you say: "Once I get interested in a topic I find it opens up the pathway to so many other topics....It's like an unquenchable thirst to keep discovering/learning new things. I am grateful for that. But I don't focus on one thing long enough to do it really, really well. I need to reel that in..."

I don't know if you read any of Sher's books - but what you say here is the very definition of a scanner - we scan things - we do not specialize in any of them :) Sher does a great job of making you feel good about that.

I spent good many years trying to extinguish this thirst you talk about and focus on 1-2 things and it just never really worked. Yes, I got my degree(s) and I do have a kind of a "career", but what I realized I have is a "good enough job" that lets me pursue my other interests not for the sake of any money or fame - but for the love of learning itself! It is so liberating to discover that I do not have to become an expert in things I am intersted in. Like before I thought it is a waste of time unless I am going to do "something" with it. I was crazy about theoretical physics and astronomy for a while (I keep coming back to that interest) and now I just read up on it as much as I like. Before, I was trying to concentrate on "useful" stuff, but now that I know I don't have to become a physicist and I can just enjoy my interest - I feel so much lighter, etc.

I managed to trim down my interests to reading (on different topics) and scrapbooking (which turned into memory keeping as in preserving memories in any way I see fit) But I was missing so much. Now I am just so happy that I can keep on trying - take a few piano lessons (always wanted to learn how to play Bethoveens For Elize), do yoga/pilates/meditate and abandon that if I don't feel like it, take a photography course, try my hand at blogging, travel here and there, whatever...
And all that while keeping my steady income at my "good enough job". (Sher talks a lot about having a good enough job), etc.
Anyway, I am still very under the books influence.
Check out her site, lots of useful info there too!

Posted 4 months ago #
lottielot
Member

I agree with Stella: one of the things Sher says is that some people just love learning, and if you look at the pattern of all their interests, it's the learning new things which is the real passion, not necessarily becoming an expert though. I think this book changed my life: I realised I was like this and that's ok. And then I went off and got a psychology degree because it's an unbelievably diverse subject so I knew I wouldn't get bored! Now I'm struggling a bit because the next obvious step is a PhD (haven't heard if I've got it yet), and I'm worried that having to specialise will make me lose motivation. I can stand anything except being bored...

Posted 4 months ago #
celebkiriedhel
Member

Thanks Susanintexas. I'm seeing what I can. Although I do need to declutter severely.

I think I'm part scanner, part renaissance myself. Each hobby I've had, I haven't really discarded when the new one's come along.

My main hobbies are:

Music - singing, playing piano and guitar, listening to many styles of music. I've sung in choirs - and will do again - but probably sticking to just Handel's Messiah at Christmas time in a people's Messiah. I play guitar every week for church, and I used to play piano most every day when it was in the house with me.

I would LOVE to learn the harp.

Books - reading, writing, thinking. Books around me feels like home. And I read everything - philosophy, psychology, history, fiction, science-fiction, craft, design, etc, etc. Most books I read more than once.

Craft - Sewing, patchworking, embroidery, cross-stitch, crotcheting, painting, drawing, paper-art.

I also collect Ball Jointed Dolls, which require a lot of craft too - to paint, dress, pose and photograph them.

Really, the only hobby I think is ditchable is ceramic painting - and that's simply because I haven't found a place that has a kiln near where I live.

I try to avoid new hobbies, simply because I don't have anywhere to put them! And most all of these crafts I have been doing for the last 30 years fairly consistently up until the last 5 years.

Although I have wanted to learn stained-glass for a long time too. :blush:

Posted 4 months ago #
shebolt
Member

I haven't read the books in question, so I don't know what I am. But I don't think I'm a scanner. I have a lot of hobbies, but a few main ones have been my focus for a while now:

Cycling: Since 1997. Started racing in 2007. I love this sport! I get outside in the fresh air, I am in great shape, and I am on a fantastic team.

Card-making: Since 2001. I have an entire room set up for this purpose, and enjoy making greeting cards.

Reading: I'm a compulsive reader and go through dozens and dozens of books a year (mostly sci-fi/fantasy)

Gaming: I don't remember when I started playing WoW, but I quit that a few years ago and just started playing Star Wars: the Old Republic.

I also have secondary interests:

Gardening: I've been successfully growing my own vegetables since 1998. I've been less successful at my perennial beds, since I started racing my bicycle.

Snowboarding: Since 1994. I only go a few times a year, but I enjoy it.

Hiking: Every vacation my husband and I take are to destinations with great trails. Oh how I love being in the wilderness.

I have some inactive/abandonded interests:

Medieval reinactment: Started in college. My husband lost interest so I sort of let it slide.

Tennis: Got really good in high school, gave it up to focus on my studies in college. When I'm done with competitive cycling, I can always get back into this sport.

Volleyball: Had to abandon because of a knee injury.

Swimming: Was competitive as a child. Still swim in my cycling off-season. Competed in one triathlon.

Sewing: Mostly to suppport the medieval reinactment. Never really enjoyed it.

Beading: Tried to pick it up in college. Bought a ton of supplies. They've been sitting for years (they don't take up a lot of room). I've recently been hankering to take this up again as I'm seeing some really cute projects. I've purchases supplies to make some of them, and even made a necklace recently.

Running: Took this up before the triathlon. Let it slide since.

I think my husband is a Scanner. He's bounced from interest to interest. First he wants to build car models, so he buys a ton of model kits, works a little on them, then puts them away because now he wants Radio Control vehicles. Buys a ton of them, plays with them for a bit, then puts them away because now he wants to fix up an old car. Buys a car, fixes one thing on it, then ignores it completely because he's decided he wants to build Balsa airplanes. We have closets full of stuff from hobbies he's abandonded. Sometimes he goes back to them, sometimes he just sells everything off. It's frustrating for me right now because we are paying for insurance and registration for a car that isn't really driveable and which he hasn't touched in months. Instead, he's building balsa planes again. Sigh.

Posted 4 months ago #
themusiclivez
Member

@Stella - Thank you so much! I think I will need to check out the books. I find that I do the same thing. I have a good enough job that lets me pursue my hobbies/interests but I always feel like I should be "doing something more" with the hobbies I have,almost as if I need to learn how to make a career out of them. I think Sher's books will be very insightful for me!

Posted 4 months ago #
chacha1
Member

me, too. going to look 'em up on Amazon now. :-)

Posted 4 months ago #
sleepykitten
Member

Interesting...but I think there is a big difference between being a "scanner" and having "fantasy selves" to unclutter. (Granted, I haven't read the book, so maybe I am misinterpreting.) If you are truly enjoying doing multiple things, then you are DOING them, right? So none of them are clutter! But if you have items from fantasy selves that just make you feel stressed, then those things are clutter.

I feel like I have many interests and love to learn - but that doesn't mean I am interested in EVERYTHING.

Posted 4 months ago #
Stella
Member

@themusiclivez and chacha1 - you won't regret it!

I just finished Renaissance Souls and it was very good as well.
I applied some of the advice already, but just reading about all of it was worth it.

Both authors have webistes on the topic too!

Good luck and enjoy! ;)

Posted 4 months ago #

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